


Hubris

by Holdt



Category: Stagate SG1
Genre: Character Study, Fatal Flaws, Firsts Challenge, M/M, Slash, UST
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-18
Updated: 2010-01-18
Packaged: 2017-10-06 12:15:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/53554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Holdt/pseuds/Holdt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Slash/pre-slash.<br/>Lead in to Absolute Power. Short Character Flaw Study of Daniel Jackson.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hubris

He supposed it had all begun with the child, Sha're's son. His son. Before he knew Oma Desala existed, back when he thought that all  
it took was a few hours of meditation and the best of intentions. When he thought the fire and telekinesis were his, when he was so proud and so eager to show Jack what he could do. In that moment, he forgot everything about the mission, everything about the people they were there to save.  
He'd felt reckless. He could do anything, couldn't he? Right any wrong, settle any dispute, and all to his own satisfaction. No one else would have to die. No one else would ever have to endure what he had endured – what they all had endured.  
The first two or so hours, it was all about humanity and galactic peace, then he discovered that the more big problems he solved in his head, the more little things bothered him. He thought up ways to streamline traffic, birth rates, economic standards...his own comfort. Oma's news wasn't surprising, considering their allies seemed to have a habit of withholding pertinent information. Though he'd done his best to remain stoic in the face of the truth, it cut him deep.  
That was mistake number one.  
He didn't pay it much attention then, though the linguist in him could see the way his teammates distanced themselves from him as he tried to explain metaphysics, candles, and meals that were already cooked. Perhaps it would have worked out better if he hadn't been trying to explain while sporting a massive hardon, but then, discovery tended to excite him. Jack had even joked that given an unknown artifact and a few glasses of wine, Daniel could be the cheapest date on the planet – If he could be persuaded to put the damn rock down. That one was still bouncing around the commissary.  
So there was nothing particularly out of the ordinary for them to pick up on, but all the same they did. What was different was the way their body language changed, the way the set of their shoulders and the tiniest involuntary muscle movements screamed mistrust and doubt. He'd been frustrated with them and their inability to see the innate rightness of what he was doing. He'd argued, threatened, sulked, and all but ignored their misgivings, and in the end...he'd been wrong. As time passed, he began to feel that perhaps it was that very mistrust which had caused him to fail, so when he began to experiment, he didn't see the need to share that information. That was mistake number two.  
Why shouldn't he have the right to lie to himself? They all did it - Sam constantly lying to herself about how she and Jack were going to retire with a white picket fence; Jack constantly lying to himself about how little he gave a damn about anyone and how maybe one day, he might just WANT to settle down with Sam. Teal'c...was lying to himself about his loyalties so that he didn't have to face the millions of Jaffa still under Gould rule who needed a strong leader. They were all liars.  
Try as he might, Daniel never seemed to pick up the knack. Oh, he tried. He tried like hell, because if there was one thing that he had learned, it was that when the lights went out, everything he'd ever seen, every stinking snake-pit torture chamber and filth encrusted cell came back with a vengeance, only no one ever saved him, because Jack wasn't there. Coffee helped.  
Even afterward, when they'd returned and the child was safely with Oma, he kept trying. Kept pushing himself because that one taste of power had been enough to reconfigure his entire worldview. He strove to attain kel'nor'ree with Teal'c. He studied ascension and the Ancients in his downtime, driven to find that missing element. Hadn't he suffered and learned enough to warrant more? Wasn't he good enough? He found that the concept of power was almost as exciting as the reality, albeit false. He found himself fantasizing about it, in his bed at night - how it would feel...how they would all look at him, how everyone would want him. No one would ever throw him away again.  
Covers thrown back, skin beaded with sweat, hand furiously pumping his cock, he imagined Jack's approval, Jack's apologies, and Jack's hands as he swore to protect him, to listen to him. He'd let the fantasy bloom, wiggling his ass into the cool silk bed sheets, tongue licking out to taste his lower lip as he drove himself relentlessly. Voice whispering in the darkness as he whimpered and pleaded for what he wanted in exactly the way he would never allow, outside of those moments. It was selfish, and base, and filthy and he knew it. Still, he came like a rocket every time, warm heat flooding his hand and hot shame making him blush in his empty room on the heels of the most vivid imagery he could dredge up from stolen glances in the showers.  
He wanted. In light of what he wanted, that fantasy was probably his most damning mistake.  
After meeting Sifu for the second time and nursing a migraine the size of St. Petersburg, Daniel had an epiphany he couldn't ignore. He was a good man, but he was no saint. He was brilliant, yes...but access to the type of control he dreamed of would destroy him and everything he loved. He now knew with confidence that no amount of power or force in the world would give him what he wanted. No amount of smoke and mirrors could soften Jack O'Neill's heart. Superpowers were passé at best.  
It was with a sense of wonder that Daniel saw that Jack was the only one who had always come back for him, the only one who argued and snapped and drove Daniel to the excellence he was so proud of. The one who always pulled him out of the self-recriminations he barely realized he was entertaining. It was Jack, who always saw his potential. It was Jack, who was the very basis of his pride in himself.  
Jack.  
That was the first time he truly realized what he could have become, without Jack, and he was fiercely glad to know that even in that extremity, his Jack would cut him down.  
He slept more soundly for it.


End file.
